Suggested citation: Albers, T. & Salomons, O., (Eds.) (2021). Building Blocks for Promoting Positive Mental Health in Youth Work. Sharing Emerging Perspectives from the Field. Aalten: Anatta Foundation.

Foreword by Editors

In a time where young people’s health and wellbeing is being challenged more than ever before, the role and importance of youth work is indescribable. As you will probably know, the youth work sector has the resources and expertise to support young people in their personal growth and development, providing them with safe and supportive learning environments in which to flourish.

This publication is a collection of articles and aims to share youth workers’ expertise gathered over the past decades with regards to the promotion of positive mental health. The articles are written by youth workers from Europe. They clarify and offer a deeper context to a theoretical framework on the promotion of positive mental health and wellbeing that has been developed as part of an Erasmus+ funded project.

Personal growth and the experiencing of wellbeing are only possible in symbiosis with the environment. Young people learn from the youth workers and the youth workers learn from the young people. The authors of the articles have aimed to share their insights, gathered over their many years of experience within the European youth sector in which they learnt with and from young people.

This Erasmus+ project is called ‘Positive Mental Health and Wellbeing’ and aims to promote the wellbeing and flourishing of young people. It seeks to do this through providing a theoretical framework, sharing emerging perspectives from the field and a practical manual offering learning opportunities for both young people and youth workers. In the manual you can find guidelines, practical exercises and narratives on how to promote positive mental health in your daily work as a youth worker. All publications can be downloaded from the project website: www.positivementalhealth.eu.

We are grateful to the young people for being teachers and for the youth workers for devoting themselves to creating a better world. We especially want to thank the authors and the project partner organisations for sharing their insights, knowledge and expertise.

May this publication inspire you to enrich and deepen your youth work practices.

With loving kindness,
Thomas Albers & Oda Salomons